


Nuvole Bianche

by Boredofusername



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bucky's POV, F/M, M/M, Multi, this is a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 10:46:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18030272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Boredofusername/pseuds/Boredofusername
Summary: Life goes on. Whether you suck on a lollipop or shoot your target, twenty-four hours is all you get.





	Nuvole Bianche

**Author's Note:**

> This is my brainchild for what I think things inside Bucky's head are like. His memories are not in chronological order, so neither will this story be. I haven't held back on anything, so there are explicit descriptions of violence, a paragraph of non/con among other things. That paragraph will be highlighted. 
> 
> The title is taken from the composition by Ludovico Einaudi of the same title. 
> 
> Note: This work is not Beta'ed. All the mistakes are mine.

He knows violence. The slow thrum of something else under his skin, shifting darkness which is completely foreign to him and yet so his own has been festering like a wound for a while now.

His hands shake a little as he lights a cigarette, casually leaning against a tree. His eyes are lazily resting on Steve. They always are. He pulls a long drag, letting the smoke settle in his chest for a moment before letting go. He feels a heaviness in him which has nothing to do with this war.

He has told Steve about Zola, but nothing beyond his official report. Ironically he has spoken to Agent Carter. She has the impassiveness of an uninvolved party which Steve doesn’t and that makes it harder for him to choke out his horrors. He has learned to quiet his nightmares. He is not leaving Steve, and so he can’t leave the army. He has to keep his demons in chains.

‘Buck, come eat your food, they are getting cold.’

‘Mrs. Rogers please grace us with your presence.’ He flicks the butt of his cigarette at Dum Dum. Steve’s ears are pinkish from the tease. His smirk is unintentional.

 

His body feels cold. Colder. Steve’s burn like a furnace now. He often ends up scooting in Steve’s space at night craving warmth. Nobody says a word.

 

His heart wants to break out of his rib case, his food traveling back to his mouth and he thinks he is going to faint. But Steve needs him and he has always been a good actor. So far, all of their missions have been a success. There is no reason this one shouldn’t. But then why when he looks at Steve’s clear blue eyes, hears the laughter of Morita at a dirty joke Felsworth cracked, it feels like saying goodbye? He lights a cigarette.

 

The fall is a long one. His scream follows him and death rides his slowly freezing chest as he feels all of his bones shatter at the impact on the ground. His vision gets knocked black, cold encasing everything. Finally.   

 

 

He knows violence. Hell, he is violence. But what he has never been, is indifferent towards it. And that is what gets him when his memories slowly return. Patchy and punched full of electrical holes as they are, they are his to keep. Along with all his nightmares. He tries to build a life on top of them, quiet and unassuming, living (hiding, no, NO! He is not hiding) in a small one-room apartment in Bucharest. Until, Captain America comes knocking on his door and there he is, back in an alleyway, pulling Steve away from bullies twice his size. Some things in life don’t change. Thank Fuck for that.   

He has been entrusted with a group of kids. Well, at least kids by their physical age. Their eyes are hard, ancient. His handler explains to him the objectives and gives him a manual of instructions. It makes him feel an emotion he no longer has a name for. But he is not supposed to feel anything. The freezer burn on his muscles tells him that. He is an asset. A weapon. And he is about to make a dozen more.

His body tells him he has been good with children, but he doesn’t know why he knows that. He looks at the children he now needs to turn in to killers. He sees a pair of bright blue eyes, for a moment. Overlapped by a pair of bluish grey one. A trickle of laughter, a tiny curse quiet on a breath. The images leave as soon as they come. He barks the kids to move. 

 

He has a pair of claws inches from his face. He is … irritated? Scared. A bit. He runs. Then he is captured, and a man barks a sequence of nine codes and he is no more. When he comes back, he tells Steve that he used to wear newspaper on his shoes. Steve smiles, and a pressure unlocks from his chest. Maybe he can atone his sins. Sins he didn’t ask for but are his, nonetheless.

 

All the kids have the same blank faces. It is eerie. They are always like that. Sometimes one of them show a hint or two of emotions and then they are taken away. Sometimes they come back. Sometimes they do not.

 A few of them are older. Almost adults.

One of them has fiery red hair. She also has the steadiest hands he has ever seen on any of his pupils. She makes him feel things. Things he can’t afford to feel. Not here. Not with the walls painted red. But he feels them no less. Sometimes, their eyes linger a fraction of a moment longer. Sometimes he wants.

 

When Steve first kisses him, (always the braver one between the two) he shoves him hard. He is so scared. And then Steve pleads his name like a prayer, and his entire fears cascade into an avalanche of wants, wants and wants until he has no room to be scared. They fuck on the floor, the bed makes too much noise and the walls are thin. Steve makes the most beautiful faces when he comes. Caught between too much pleasure, a brief sting of pain and so many emotions trapped in his blue eyes.

 

The mouth on him is so soft that a moan rips out of him despite his best attempt. He doesn’t even know he misses this. This physical intimacy. His hands shake a bit as he cups her breasts in a reverence. She gives no hint of arousal besides blown pupils and a quickened breath. He is careful to leave no marks. Her hands give his shoulder a squeeze and slowly drifts down his hands- both flash and metal alike and pull on his belt. He shakes his head minutely. There is no time. She nods briefly and then she is gone.

He is awarded electricity to his head for his solicitation. He mourns the shock of red hair before that is taken from him too.  

 

He is sitting on a rooftop in Spain. A city he has no name for. He knows the latitude and longitude. Objective- retrieve the hard drive and kill the target. His body grounds into silence as he presses the trigger. The car’s hind tire goes flat and it crashes on a pole on the roadside. He jumps down from the rooftop and walks towards the car. Two bodies crawl out of the driver and passenger sides, one male and one female. The female has red hair, which glow in the setting sun. His hands twitch. He knows how it feels like to run his hands through the red locks, he knows the textures. Why?

The female covers his target. He aims and shoots, but somehow misses her vitals although it takes out the target. He checks her pulse before leaving. 

 

They say the target is important. That he is the obstacle between them and world peace. He doesn’t care. He goes to war. That is all he knows. That is all he is. War. Blood. Cold.  His target is blonde, tall and American. It gives him a pause. When he finally sees the face, he feels disappointed. But he isn’t expecting anyone he knows, is he? He doesn’t shoot or stab the man. He ODs the target on Morphine. A less brutal death.

 

He is holding Steve’s hands. His grip is death tight. If it were someone ordinary, it would have completely severed their blood flow to the fingers. Steve is not ordinary. They are at Farmer’s market and he is panicking. Too much noise, too many possible targets and not enough exits. Steve rubs his thumb slowly on his, and he tries to regulate his breathing to something slow. Steve buys him some plums.

He apologizes to Tony when his memory of Howard comes back. Tony hides in his workshop for two days before offering him a cup of coffee and asking him for all details of Hydra so they can annihilate the cancer. He cries for the first time in almost eighty years that day. Steve is there, but for once, this is his forgiveness, his sin atoned and it makes him feel human. Just a fraction.

 

He loves the red-haired woman twice more. Natalia, he remembers and both the times it is taken away. He knows each time what is coming. So he loves her harder. He loves her with enough brutality to leave crescent-shaped marks on her collar bones. She loves him with kindness he doesn’t deserve nor returns. But she understands. This is the only way he knows how to care anymore. He is devoid of all things human.

_There is another red-haired woman. Much, much later. He knows because the world is too foreign to him once again. But this time, there is no love. He is strapped to a gurney. His legs are apart. His mouth is choked and someone pumps him full of brackish water through his anus. There’s a vibrator shoved in after and when she is done riding him and he is released, he drips out liter worth of red liquid as he shivers and collapses on the floor. He never dreams of red hairs again. He screams in their nightmare._

 

He is standing in front of an alley. In Brooklyn_ says the signboard above a grocery shop. Something is missing in the alley. A house-size something and a person size someone. He knows this, but he doesn’t know who. He hasn’t returned to his handler after the mission. Something pulled him here. He stays hidden behind a dumpster staring ahead. A stray cat takes residence in his lap for the night. He drifts off at some point. He wakes up to a slap and a dead kitten. It is shot. He is zapped full of electricity and the world goes black.

 

The first time Steve holds his hand, they are watching their own faces on the screen in Smithsonian. He goes utterly still. Steve lets go of him and moves slightly away. He wants to scream, ‘no, come back. Please come back.’ But he is not yet fully here. Not fully human. He is an android. Too unstable. Steve holds his hand again when they go back to their apartment later. This time, he lets it.

Later that night, he slowly puts his head on Steve’s shoulder as they watch a movie and he drifts off. He sleeps through an entire night with no nightmares for the first time and drools all over Steve’s neck. Steve looks at him like Christmas has come early.

 

His therapist tells him to keep a journal. To note down all his memories. Most of the pages are torn out. He can’t bear to pen down his horrors in papers.

 

He sees how Steve looks at Agent Carter. His Steve has the body which reflects his soul now, can carry the vastness of his heart, and Bucky is no longer the only one who sees it. He makes nippy teasing which only Steve understands and turns pink. He wants to lick that pink away. So instead he smokes two cigarettes extra. Later he tells Steve ‘It’s okay.’ Steve, being the ever-virtuous one replies, he can’t choose one over the other. So they share. Each to their own and sometimes together. Those are the only moments when his head is quiet and panic stays somewhere below his diaphragm. He loves Steve’s mouth on his cock as much as Peggy’s red lipsticks all over his mouth. He has always been stained by red.

 

He breaks Steve’s nose the first night they shared a bed in Steve’s apartment as he jolts from a nightmare. Memory? He doesn’t know. He sits on the fire escape for the rest of the night.

 

He is standing in front of a red brick wall. Completely naked but caked in mud, dried blood and debris. Five men in black uniform have their guns pointed at him, while two other hoses him clean. Later, a man, Alexander is his name sits on a chair and caresses his head on his lap and tells him how good an asset he is. He gets two extra slices of bacon on his dinner that night.

 

Next mission is a mess. The target turns out quite elusive and when he is back on the base, he is waterboarded. That is the thing with torture. They break your mind so much more than your body. He begs, and begs, in English- ‘please, stop’, in Russian ‘pozhaluysta’ but they just keep drowning him until he has no breath left to beg. He thinks he hears someone laugh. It is the coldest sound he has ever heard.

 

When the photos of his cybernetic modifications are shown to the jury, Steve breaks the wooden handle of the witness stand. Steve is barred from the court for the rest of the proceeding. He is cleared of all charges but all he feels is guilt. That night, sitting in a hotel room Steve cries for hours kneeling in front of him, holding on to his leg. He doesn’t. He has no tears left to afford. But he shakes for the rest of the night and vomits on the carpet.

 

Natalia, (Natasha now) teaches him to dance again in Tony’s Avenger’s tower. They break into an easy waltz- familiar twirls and muscle memory guiding them into a lazy dance. He can see the way Clint’s eyes remain sharp but edges fading into silent amusement and soft warmth. But he falters when he glances back at Steve. So much longing trapped in those blue eyes that they practically scream at him. He gives Steve a small smile of his own.

Next time they dance, Steve is there with a sketchbook and charcoal. He feels peaceful looking at the sky dipping into stars of the night.

 

Do aliens come out of the sky?? There is a spiderman? A God OF Thunder? He goes to his shrink twice in a week just to make sure he finally hasn’t lost all his marbles. Turns out he hasn’t. Future is awesome(?) that way.

He can also kiss Steve at random, anywhere. They are internet famous. Tony via JARVIS sends him Captain America porn which delights him but thoroughly embarrasses Steve.  He lets Tony design him a better arm as a thank you. He also buys soft bunny slippers and Cap tees. He and Sam swat Peter randomly in a game of ‘fuck, there’s a spider.’ Peter hasn’t freaked out yet. He owes Tony money.

When Steve sucks him the first time he is not Winter Soldier anymore, he comes almost on the second stroke. Turns out Captain America can suck some cock. Steve fondles his balls and pushes his hip forward using his other hand. Let’s not be said he is slow at anything. So after a brief inquiry via a raised eyebrow, he tentatively pushes himself a little deeper into Steve’s mouth. After a few thrusts, his hips undulate almost on its own volition as Steve pushes his own zipper down and takes himself on his hand. He almost bliss out at the sight. Steve with a mouthful of cock and riding his own hand is a sight no electricity can ever wipe from his memory. He comes down the throat of his best friend, a kind good man and epitome of all things brave and grand and laughs when Steve winks at him, promptly coming on his own hand- mouth falling open in a silent moan with his fingers caressing Steve’s head.

 

 

There are about thirty men, most dead and few unconscious and all disarmed lying around him in different stages of a medical emergency. He wipes a finger across his eyebrow. It comes off red. Whose blood, he doesn’t know. Doesn’t care. The only thing he knows is that he has failed in his mission. He runs.

When he is found, they don’t immediately take him to the chair. Alexander breaks his fingers. Slowly and one at a time. Allows them to heal, and breaks again until he no longer cares about snapped bones and disjointed knuckles. Then he is back in the cold.

 

Steve’s ma, Sarah was a strong woman trapped in a frail body. Much like Steve is. They may not have saved her, but he isn’t going to let Steve die. Not from something so ordinary like pneumonia. Steve is too bright, too stubborn for that. He scrapes three odd jobs, steals stale bread from Mr. Jackson’s shop while returning at night, cooks Steve potato and cabbage soup and sleeps aligning their breathing together. Winter passes, Steve breaks his nose in a fight again and he finds a spring to his steps. Again.  

 

They grab each other a little too tight before he leaves, he because he knows he isn’t coming back from this war and Steve because he has so much more to prove.

 

The man, this stubborn hero who keeps saying is his friend – he shot him twice so far. The man drops his shield down the Triskelion. He says his name is ‘James Buchanan Barnes.’ He beats his face to a pulp. And then they fall. He feels this yearn as he watches the man plummeting to the watery death below which explains absolutely nothing but compels him to jump under too. He leaves the man on the bank of the lake.

 

Steve drinks his coffee black. He doesn’t have a preference. Steve says he liked his with milk and sugar. He doesn’t. He is not ‘him’ anymore. The one he thinks Steve wants. But he drinks his coffee. He owes Steve if nothing, then the peace of a lie.

They find their way back around like a new jigsaw puzzle. Same old formula but new twists. Steve still radiates warmth like a thermostat, and he is still cold. But it is thawing slowly. They dare not kiss yet. But share their breaths in almost reverence, like a prayer in the dark of their bedroom. Steve gave him his room but he never called a place home. It is a sentiment which is bone-deep and orbits around Steve.

 

When Hydra comes for him, they are sleeping in their pajamas. He covers Steve before the bullet could go through his skull. He slits throats after throats till all they have in their apartment are severed heads and decapitated bodies. Steve is quiet but solid behind him. Always protecting his six. And then he hears it - the voice of Zola from a cellphone screen radiating green light. He is told to be the perfect soldier. He is told to be the fist of Hydra. He is told, all he is is a weapon for others to use.  Steve breaks the cellphone with his shield but he is broken long back. He hides in the bathroom for the rest of the night.

 

He is standing in a bedroom on the first floor of a suburb.  He has just shot the man, the husband. The woman has fainted. He is not going to shoot her. She is not in his mission parameters. But he freezes when he turns towards the door. There is a child standing there hugging a plush toy. The child has very blue eyes. They are unblinking and fixed on him. He feels a remorse wash over him which would have broken into a shiver if he weren’t trained to be a ghost. He jumps out of the window rather than going through the door.

 

He prefers fast, swift kills over torture. He quite doesn’t have the patience. So the first time he tortures a target for information he ends up being so messy that there is barely anything left for salvage. His handler beats the shit out of him with a baton that night.

Next time, he drills a nail into his target’s femur with the precision of a surgeon. They get the information and he tells nobody how he said ‘Sorry’ to his victim before putting one single bullet to his head. He goes to the chair himself that day.

 

He fucks Steve on their kitchen island. Cold marble of the countertop grounds him as he drowns in Steve’s blue eyes and buries himself into the impossible warmth of his body. Steve walks funny for the rest of the day. If he is smirking it is nobody but his business.

 

Sam gets him some pancakes from his favorite deli and they share trivia, memes, and news while eating them in the kitchen. Sam tells him about Riley. He feels a swell of gratitude that Sam is Steve’s friend.

 

‘On your left’ becomes ‘On your left’ and ‘On your right’. So Sam just refuses to jog and joins a gym instead. Steve gives him five bucks and a curt nod. He buys a lollypop with that and sucks in front of Steve while making absolutely obscene noises. Steve pulls a Pavlov’s dog boner every time he sucks a lollipop after that.  It is the little pleasures which count, he tells himself.

 

He has this gnawing pain in his belly. ‘Hunger’ his brain supplies mechanically. He is below optimum level functioning but it has to do. He has been waiting in this warehouse for past seventy-three hours, seven minutes and thirty-five seconds. He waits and waits but his target never shows. His handler asks him to wait at the rendezvous point for another twelve hours.  He stands in rain, still, like the shadow he is, while waiting to be taken back. An old woman with a walking stick tells him to stand in her shed and gives him soup and dumplings. He doesn’t know what this feeling is called which is clogging up his chest.

 

It is the first day he is at Steve’s apartment. Steve feeds him two days’ worth of food and dumps another helping of potato mesh when he finally says no. Steve looks at him like he wants to argue but he doesn’t. He is given a room, a bath of his own and his own clothes which are not tactical gear. He sleeps on the cold floor instead.

He walks around Steve’s apartment like a spooked cat. They are always walking around each other so carefully and it annoys him. But he no longer has enough words to string together what he wants. If he can want things anymore. It feels like he doesn’t deserve to. But Steve insists on him having choices of everything.

 

He finally shaves. His reflection in the mirror overlaps with his scarce memory of ‘him’. He throws the razor and breaks the mirror. Steve finds him sitting on the bathtub fully clothed. He is quietly led to the kitchen and Steve softly runs his hands through his hair before he starts cutting it short.

‘You are Bucky. You will always be my Bucky. I don’t want the old you. I am not the old me. But I am still me and you are still you, Buck. And I will have whatever, whoever you give me.’ Steve tells to the silence of the kitchen and their quiet breathing.

‘I am Bucky.’ He whispers back.


End file.
